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Exogenously Triggered Perceptual Switches in Multistable Structure-From-Motion Occur in the Absence of Visual Awareness

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Exogenously Triggered Perceptual Switches in Multistable Structure-From-Motion Occur in the Absence of Visual Awareness Journal of Vision (2016) 16(3):14, 1–16 1 Exogenously triggered perceptual switches in multistable structure-from-motion occur in the absence of visual awareness Department of General Psychology and Methodology, Otto-Friedrich-Universitat¨ Bamberg, Bamberg, Germany Center for Behavioral Brain Sciences, Magdeburg, Germany Cognitive Biology, Otto-von-Guericke Universitat,¨ # Alexander Pastukhov Magdeburg, Germany $ Berlin School of Mind and Brain, Humboldt-Universitat¨ zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany Center for Behavioral Brain Sciences, Magdeburg, Germany Cognitive Biology, Otto-von-Guericke Universitat,¨ Jan-Nikolas Klanke Magdeburg, Germany $ Here, we characterize the duration of exogenously Introduction triggered perceptual switches in an ambiguously rotating structure-from-motion display and demonstrate their independence on visual awareness. To this end, we Typically, we experience our perception as stable and triggered a perceptual reversal by inverting the on-screen unambiguous, in a sense that the same retinal input motion and systematically varied the posttrigger results in the same perception that remains constant presentation duration, while collecting observers’ reports even during prolonged viewing. However, this seeming about the initial and final directions of illusory rotation. one-to-one relationship between sensory inputs and We demonstrate that for the structure-from-motion perception is an illusion (Gregory, 2009; Metzger, display, perceptual transitions are extremely brief (20 2009). This is particularly clear when it is violated by ms) and can be considered instantaneous from an so-called multistable displays that are compatible with experimental perspective. We also report that although several distinct and comparably plausible perceptual very brief posttrigger intervals (10–20 ms) reliably initiate interpretations. These displays force the visual percep- a perceptual reversal, observers become aware of tion to continuously switch between alternatives despite perceptual switches only if the posttrigger presentation constant sensory evidence (Blake & Logothetis, 2002; continues for at least 80 ms. Additional experiments Leopold & Logothetis, 1999). demonstrated that an observed lack of visual awareness The single most studied aspect of multistable for brief posttrigger presentation intervals cannot be attributed to either a systematic delay of visual awareness perception is perceptual switching, and we have a fair, or to backward masking. Our results show that although hardly complete, understanding of how the exogenously triggered perceptual reversal can occur in the occurrence of perceptual reversals can be predicted absence of visual awareness, extending earlier work on from the stimulus properties (Brouwer & van Ee, 2006; spontaneous reversals that indicated that neither Kang, 2009; Levelt, 1965) and prior perceptual awareness nor attention may be required for multistable experience (Blake, Westendorf, & Fox, 1990; Kang & perception. Methodologically, the brevity and the short Blake, 2010; Nawrot & Blake, 1989; Pastukhov & latency of induced perceptual reversals make them Braun, 2011; Wolfe, 1984). The neural correlates of particularly suitable for finely timed experiments, such as endogenous triggers of spontaneous reversals are magneto/electroencephalography studies. currently debated, but recent evidence from imaging Citation: Pastukhov, A., & Klanke, J. N. (2016). Exogenously triggered perceptual switches in multistable structure-from-motion occur in the absence of visual awareness. Journal of Vision, 16(3):14, 1–16, doi:10.1167/16.3.14. doi: 10.1167/16.3.14 Received September 14, 2015; published February 12, 2016 ISSN 1534-7362 Downloaded from jov.arvojournals.orgThis work ison licensed 09/23/2021 under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Journal of Vision (2016) 16(3):14, 1–16 Pastukhov & Klanke 2 words, exogenously triggered perceptual reversals occur in the absence of visual awareness. Methods Observers Procedures were in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and were approved by the medical ethics board of the Otto-von-Guericke Universita¨t, Magde- burg: ‘‘Ethik-Komission der Otto-von-Guericke-Uni- versita¨t an der Medizinischen Fakulta¨t.’’ All participants had normal or corrected-to-normal vision. Apart from the second author, observers were naive to the purpose of experiments and were paid for their participation. Figure 1. An exogenously triggered reversal of illusory rotation in structure-from-motion displays. Either an inversion of the 2D motion at time Ttrigger (A, illustrated for two example dots) may Apparatus trigger a reversal of the illusory rotation (B) or the illusory rotation may remain stable, following a spatial readjustment of Stimuli were generated with MATLAB using the individual flow elements (C). See also Movie 1. Psychophysics Toolbox (Brainard, 1997) and displayed on a CRT screen (Iiyama VisionMaster Pro 514, studies suggests that they are localized in sensory areas iiyama.com, resolution 1,600 3 1,200 pixels, refresh of the brain rather than in regions associated with rate 100 Hz). The viewing distance was 73 cm so that executive control and attention (Fra¨ssle, Sommer, each pixel subtended approximately 0.0198. Observers Jansen, Naber, & Einha¨user, 2014; Knapen, Brascamp, responded using a keyboard. Background luminance Pearson, van Ee, & Blake, 2011; Weilnhammer, was kept at 36 cd/m2. The experimental room was lit Ludwig, Hesselmann, & Sterzer, 2013). Less is known dimly (ambient luminance at 80 cd/m2). about the duration of perceptual reversals and about the exact temporal relationship between a trigger event, changes within a sensory representation, and the Display following visual awareness of that switch. This is primarily because we infer the timing of perceptual The SFM stimulus consisted of 50 dots distributed reversals from observers’ immediate responses, which over the surface of the sphere. The sphere diameter was are too variable to provide a reliable estimate 5.78, and the dot diameter was 0.0578. For the main (Pastukhov, Vonau, & Braun, 2012). object (presented during the main Ton interval), the To overcome this limitation, we investigated the dots were distributed in such a way as to ensure a temporal characteristics of exogenously triggered specific distance between all left- and right-moving dots switches (Pastukhov et al., 2012; Treue, Andersen, at the time of the on-screen motion inversion (Ttrigger, Ando, & Hildreth, 1995; see Figure 1; Movie 1). To offset of Tpre/onset of Tpost presentation intervals) to quantify the duration of exogenously triggered per- maximize the probability of triggering a perceptual ceptual switches in structure-from-motion (SFM) switch (see Stonkute, Braun, & Pastukhov, 2012, for displays, we established the duration of the intermedi- details). For the probe stimulus (presented during the ate/mixed perception following an exogenous trigger probe interval), the dots were distributed randomly event. For this, we report that perceptual reversals in over the surface of the sphere. Both main and probe SFM are extremely brief. In addition, we combined stimuli were generated anew on every trial. several experimental measures to dissociate a domi- nance change within sensory representations and the visual awareness of this change. We demonstrate that Experiment 1 although the inversion of the on-screen motion appears to trigger the reversal of perceptual dominance even if Nine observers (five of them female, four male) the posttrigger presentation is stopped after 20 ms, the participated in the experiment. Each of the four observers become aware of that only if the following experimental conditions (see below) was measured in a presentation period is at least 80 ms long. In other separate experimental session. Each session consisted Downloaded from jov.arvojournals.org on 09/23/2021 Journal of Vision (2016) 16(3):14, 1–16 Pastukhov & Klanke 3 of eight blocks, and each block contained 70 trials. of the logistic function were obtained using a bootstrap Note that the trials from Experiments 1 and 2 were procedure implemented in the Palamedes toolbox. equally intermixed during each block (i.e., 35 trials belonged to Experiment 1 and 35 to Experiment 2). Each trial consisted of a random onset delay (0.5–1 Experiment 2 s), a pretrigger interval (Tpre ¼ [500, 625, 750, 875, 1000] ms), an optional posttrigger interval (Tpost ¼ [10, 20, 40, Nine observers (five female, four male) participated 80, 160, 320] ms), and a response interval (Figure 2A). in the experiment. The procedure was identical to that The direction of the two-dimensional (2D) motion was of Experiment 1 but for an additional probe SFM inversed at the onset of the posttrigger interval, and the display. The visual sequence of Experiment 1 was presentation continued for a predefined amount of time followed by a brief blank interval (Tblank ¼ 50 ms) and (Tpost). The purpose of the on-screen motion inversion the probe SFM display (Tprobe ¼ 500 ms). The probe was to trigger a reversal of the perceived illusory stimulus was a different sphere (i.e., the location of rotation (Pastukhov et al., 2012; Treue et al., 1995; see individual flow elements was different from that of the Figure 1). The ‘‘no inversion’’ presentation condition main sphere). Observers reported on the initial rotation contained no on-screen motion inversion and, corre- of the main stimulus and on the final direction of spondingly, no postinversion presentation
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